Syria fighter pilot defects in new blow to Assad

A Syrian pilot was granted political asylum after landing his MiG fighter jet in neighbouring Jordan Thursday, in the first such defection of a revolt a watchdog says has killed more than 15,000 people.

"The council of ministers has decided to grant the pilot, Colonel Hassan Merei al-Hamade, political asylum," Jordanian Information Minister Samih Maaytah told AFP after a government official said the Russian MiG-21 had made an emergency landing at a base in Mafraq near the border.

Syrian state television said the plane was flying near the border when contact was lost at 0734 GMT, and Jordan said it crossed the frontier minutes later.

The opposition Syrian National Council said: "The plane took off at high speed and flew at low altitude from a military base between Daraa and Sweida in the south of the country ... to avoid detection by radar."

"The pilot is from Deir Ezzor (in eastern Syria) and his family is known for its opposition" to President Bashar al-Assad's regime, spokesman George Sabra added.

State television quoted the defence ministry as denouncing Hamade.

"The pilot is considered a deserter and a traitor to his country, and to his military honour, and he will be sanctioned under military rules," it cited the ministry as saying.

"Relevant contacts have been made with the authorities in Jordan in order to recover the jet on which the traitor pilot made his getaway."

Washington welcomed the defection.

"This is just one of countless instances where Syrians, including members of the security forces, have rejected the horrific actions of the Assad regime, and certainly it will not be the last," said National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor.

Tens of thousands of soldiers have defected from Syria's armed forces since the revolt against Assad's rule erupted in March last year, thousands of them joining the rebel Free Syrian Army, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Diplomats, meanwhile, stepped up efforts to stem the bloodshed, with Arab states demanding that Russia stop supplying arms to Syria and the United States and Britain reportedly working on a transition plan.

"Any assistance to violence must be ceased because when you supply military equipment, you help kill people. This must stop," Arab League deputy chief Ahmed Ben Hilli told the Interfax news agency.

He also called for the mandate of United Nations and Arab League envoy Kofi Annan to be revamped, and for Iran's inclusion in talks on ending the conflict.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon discussed the situation with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday on the sidelines of an international conference in Rio de Janeiro, a spokesman said.

The diplomatic flurry came as British newspaper The Guardian reported that Washington and London were working on an initiative for regime change in Damascus based on Annan's UN-backed plan that calls for a "Syrian-led political transition."

Reports said Britain and the United States have discussed offering Assad immunity from prosecution if he steps down as part of a political transition package, but Britain's Foreign Office said "no new offer" was on the table.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said any peace plan for Syria that calls for Assad to leave power and go into exile would not work because he would not quit.

"A scheme according to which President Assad should leave somewhere before something happens in terms of a cessation of violence and a political process, this scheme simply does not work from the very start," Lavrov said.

Lavrov, whose country remains in close contact with Damascus, indicated that Assad was not ready to negotiate his removal from power because he was convinced he still enjoyed popular support.

"I do not think Assad will be sitting down at the negotiating table," said Lavrov, pointing to the results of a widely criticised May 7 parliamentary election which he said showed a majority still backed the Syrian leader.

Robert Ford, the US ambassador to Syria, called on Syria's military to reconsider their support for Assad, warning those committing atrocities that they will be hunted down and prosecuted.

The US and the international community "will work with the Syrian people to locate the military members responsible for this violence and hold them accountable. And we will support the future Syrian government?s efforts to bring those people to justice," Ford said in a message on his Facebook page.

In the latest bloodshed, at least 93 people were killed on Thursday, among them 52 civilians, 38 soldiers and three rebels, the Syrian Observatory said.

At least 13 civilians were killed in the central city of Homs and another two unidentified people died in nearby Qusayr, the Observatory told AFP.

Streaming video from Homs on the bambuser.com website showed smoke billowing from a residential district amid automatic gunfire and mortar blasts.

The bombardment aborted an attempt by the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Syrian Red Crescent to evacuate trapped civilians, but the agencies vowed to try again later Thursday.

Hundreds of people are believed to be trapped in the historic heart of Syria's third-largest city, unable to flee or find shelter because of the fighting, the Geneva-based agency said.

According to a new toll on Thursday, the Observatory said at least 10,480 civilians, 3,715 soldiers and 830 army defectors have been killed since March 2011.

hiroki kuroda kuroda nfl scores nfl scores gene hackman pineda john edwards heart condition